CIO Interview: David Davies, CIO, Hargreaves Lansdown

Hargreaves Lansdown's David Davies describes how he keeps on top of technology evolution, and translates its importance to his board

David, Davies, CIO of financial services firm Hargreaves Lansdown has told Computing about the importance of staying on top of evolving technologies, and argued that CIOs need to be on the board to be effective.

"Top of my agenda is the importance of evolution," said Davies. "It's critical for any organisation irrespective of industry, in order to ensure they're evolving their products, services and ultimately their IT and the way their IT performs, if organisations and specifically CIOs are not evolving and taking the front seat with that topic, their competitors will answer those questions for them. So giving time to strategy, and the strategies of the board and what clients need and want is absolutely vital to any organisation.

"We only need to look at a plethora of organisations which are no longer with us - I always use the analogy of Blockbuster and Netflix. Netflix are a huge success, but the challenge if you can imagine being the CIO at Blockbuster at that time, in retrospect would you have made different decisions? Would you have taken a different route strategically? Absolutely. So our job as CIOs is to have foresight, and to have the capability to give the right answers at the right time.

"It's always top of my agenda to understand where that next evolution is coming from. I'm also a great believer in making sure that the services that any business offering is always there and always secure. So within my business I've got three core pillars.

"And making sure that we are always on and developing the business and evolving for me, feel like the right three pillars as CIO to be focusing on. Having a great product and it not being available when clients need it is almost you can't be in that position, especially in this online world.

"We know there's an always on appetite for whatever the service may be. Making sure you're cognisant of a wide range of client requirements is absolutely vital.

"The further down the food chain the CIO is, the less capable they are of making change, or of making the point of how important technology is within the organisation, or the wider industry. The relationship with other board members, and especially the CEO is vital," he added.

Other entries in Computing's IT Leaders Interview series include:

Mayank Prakash, CIO, Department of Work and Pensions

Paul Brocklehurst, CIO, Financial Services Compensation Scheme